One of Donald Trump's heads of trade has said that the euro is a "grossly undervalued" currency and that it has been exploited by Germany, to the detriment of both the US and the rest of the EU.

Peter Navarro is the head of Mr Trump's newly formed National Trade Council.

He told The Financial Times that the euro is an "implicit Deutsche Mark" and that it gives an advantage to the German economy.

While the German economy has grown, weaker economies in the euro zone have kept down the value of the European currency, making it cheaper than a sole German currency would be.

"A big obstacle to viewing TTIP as a bilateral deal is Germany, which continues to exploit other countries in the EU as well as the US with an ‘implicit Deutsche Mark’ that is grossly undervalued," he stated - adding that the EU/US TTIP trade deal is dead.

When these comments were put to German chancellor Angela Merkel at a press conference in Sweden she replied, "Germany is a country that has always called for the ECB to pursue an independent policy, just as the Bundesbank did that before the euro existed.

"Because of that we will not influence the behaviour of the ECB. And as a result, I cannot and do not want to change the situation as it is," she added.

Mr Navarro believes that a trade deal between the US and EU would be a bilateral deal between the US and Germany disguised as a multilateral deal.

He is the author of books titled Death by China and Crouching Tiger: What China’s Militarism Means for the World. He has blamed China entering the World Trade Organisation in 2001 for economic stagnation and job losses in the US and has called on US citizens to boycott Chinese goods.